A team of South Korean scientists has uncovered the mechanism of neural stem cell death, a discovery expected to help treat such degenerative diseases as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. The team, headed by Prof. Kang Kyung-sun of Seoul National University, Monday said they pinpointed a gene responsible for deactivating the differentiation or renewal of neural stem cells. ``We found that a protein, called p38, suppresses the growth of neural stem cells. We confirmed through mice experiments that we can revive dying neural stem cells by inhibiting the protein,’’ the 42-year-old Kang said. Neural stem cells refer to multi-potent adult stem cells that are capable of renewing themselves and differentiating into neurons or other neural cells.When the stem cells fail to supply enough new neurons to replace old ones, such degenerative diseases as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and Niemann-Pick type C1 (NPC1) occur.Kang’s team used NPC1 model mice whose neural stem cells showed impairment in their self-renewal ability due to overly activated p38. They found that the neural stem cells of mice recover by inhibiting the protein.
